The overall goal of this project is to prove that from the American Revolution onward the nation building process on the East Coast and the developments in the Spanish possessions in North America became increasingly entangled until the U.S. annexation of the Southwest following the U.S.-Mexican War in 1848. It will show that during the years 1776-1826 the basis was set on which U.S. expansion into those territories over the next decades would take place, leading not only to forging the young nation, but also to nowaday´s inherent problems and challenges that lie ahead in this part of the United States. It does so by analyzing Jefferson´s policy and strategies concerning the Southwest over this period of time, with a particular eye on the ways his strategic pursuits for the nation were interconnected with his scientific concerns. Furthermore, the project seeks to explore how territorial ambitions were intertwined with both the pursuit of knowledge and the promotion of migratory processes in this area, over the given time span and their changing political identities.

In particular, the project aims to: (1) show the ways in which the developments in the East and the West became closely intertwined from the beginning of the U.S. nation building process onwards; (2) analyze the interrelationship between U.S. expansion policy, government sponsored promotion of migration, and the acquisition and creation of knowledge in those regions; (3) explore the interactions and channels through which knowledge entered the U.S. and its impact on its westward expansion; (4) understand the processes through which Jefferson converted isolated information on the Spanish and Mexican Southwest into useful, reliable andactionable intelligencefor his strategic pursuits. It addresses the urgent need to better understand the Hispanic presence in the U.S. today by tracing the historic legacy of the Southwest as a cultural crossroads, which has generated a common culture, identity, and history, still visible in this area, within and beyond the US. border.

In the setting of US westward expansion, from the start of the 1804 Lewis & Clark expedition until the 1890s, when the frontier concept had expanded to the Pacific, numerous European geographers, geologists, mineralogists, botanists and others participated in the exploration of the vast territories of the trans-Mississippi West.

Some undertook their travels either as individuals or leading independent exploration voyages, such as the naturalist P. Wilhelm of Württemberg, who in 1829 discovered the sources of the Missouri River; the surveyor D. Thompson, who navigated the Columbia River in 1811; Baron von Richthofen, a geologist discovering goldfields in California from 1862 to 1868; or the archaeologist A. F. A. Bandelier, who studied the indigenous cultures of the American Southwest. A large number of explorers formed part of important US government sponsored expeditions, such as the cartographer C. Preuss who accompanied J. C. Fremont on his exploratory expeditions to the West in the 1840s, the topographer F. W. von Egloffstein, known for his exploration of the Grand Canyon, and the geographer J.-N. Nicollet, who mapped the Upper Mississippi River basin during the 1830s as part of the Corps of Topographical Engineers. Several participated in extensive US exploration projects, such as the Pacific Railroad Surveys (1853-1855), the Geological Exploration of the Fortieth Parallel (1867-1872), or collaborated with the US Geological Survey.

This important but rather neglected chapter of the History of Science in Europe raises the following questions: What was the role European science played in the scientific reconnaissance of the American West in the 19th century? What type of knowledge was produced by these scientist-explorers? What were the processes of knowledge circulation in this information flow between the West, the centers of learning on the US East Coast and in Europe? How did the implementation of this knowledge in emerging US sciences differ from European scholarly traditions? And finally, what role did women travelers or naturalists play in this process?

The goal of this project is to obtain an integral coherent vision of the processes of knowledge production, circulation and implementation between Europe and the US through the study of the structure and dynamics of different types of scientific networks. 

Funded by the European Commission Research Executive
(AHumScienceNet, project number 327127, FP7-PEOPLE-2012-IOF)

This research project undertakes a systematic analysis and reinterpretation of the Prussian explorer, Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), as a key figure in the study of the globalization of science through the creation of intra-European and transatlantic networks. Humboldt’s ground-breaking impact on the progress of science extended beyond his contribution to particular fields of knowledge: this is mainly based on his outstanding role in the production, circulation and textual and visual representation of different forms of knowledge. Through the extensive networks with other academics, set up to discuss questions of research, exchange data and compare results, Humboldt set an early example of well-organized and fruitful international communication, which introduced new standards of networking for the progress of science in a pre-Internet era. The project analyzes the enormous impact that Alexander von Humboldt and Humboldtian science had on the process of launching modern American science during the 19th century, from his visit to the United States in spring 1804 onwards, until the end of his life in 1859. In particular, it focuses on the characteristics of and interconnections between the different types of networks he established with the academic community, as well as political leaders in the United States.

The project addresses these core issues through  four closely-interlocking sub-projects: firstly, it examines Humboldt’s North American correspondence in depth, reconstructing his scientific network and categorizing his key correspondents, the groups and professions they belonged to, and the type of information exchanged. Secondly, it analyzes the multiplicity of ways this Prussian promoted German-American scientific collaboration at the beginning of the 19th century. Thirdly, it studies different aspects of his interest in U.S. western expansion, in California in particular, based on his early research into Spanish colonial archives in Mexico.

Finally, the project does not limit its scope to Humboldt but rather takes him as a starting point, against the political backdrop of this period, researching into  the further development of the scientific relationship between Germany and the United States over the course of the 19th century, at an individual, institutional and theoretical level.